


By the Fall

by emocsibe



Series: Mag7Week Stories [1]
Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mag7Week, Period-Typical Homophobia, Present Tense, day1
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-23
Updated: 2017-09-23
Packaged: 2019-01-04 05:53:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12162819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emocsibe/pseuds/emocsibe
Summary: The day he arrives is hot, the sun in merciless, and all in all it seems that nature tries to cling to summer with all the strength it has, heating up the air and the ground, shining down on the farms, the towns, the roads, and the lone rider on one of them.Written for Mag7Week; Day1; Fall || Proposal





	By the Fall

**By the Fall**

 

The day he arrives is hot, the sun in merciless, and all in all it seems that nature tries to cling to summer with all the strength it has, heating up the air and the ground, shining down on the farms, the towns, the roads, and the lone rider on one of them. The horse’s steps kick up dust that swirls for a moment before being blown away by the tepid wind, towards the town the traveller’s headed to.

The looks he receives is nothing new, he’s grown accustomed to them, to the quiet murmurs and the curious eyes fixed on his long hair and his mismatched clothes, the hat that is now more holes than fabric.

“It should be the newcomer.”

The whisper hits his ears as he ties his horse’s reins to the pillar in front of the bar. He doesn’t turn his head or acknowledges it in any other ways that he’s heard what he wasn’t meant to, and he strides into the building, throat parched and legs aching from the long journey. The long escape – he corrects himself, then lifts a hand and offers a weak mockery of a smile to the barmaid that comes to him. He asks for water, and he hopes that his English truly is understandable – he knows it is; deep in his heart he knows. It is hard though, to get free of years’ worth of being ridiculed for the slightest errors of speech, for the smallest mispronunciations even born and bred Americans failed to notice when talking. But, he thinks as he drowns the second dose of water, slightly tasting like the metal cup it’s served in, maybe not all people of this cursed land are like that two old monsters. He scoffs looking at the counter, and shakes his head, trying to get rid of the demons hunting him since his murder of the twin devils that kept him as a labourer – more like a slave, his consciousness offers, and he takes it. Yes, he was nothing more than a slave, intended to work just until his strength remained, just until he could still lift the shovel to dig his own grave.

He pays for the water with coins stolen from the corpses he left behind, and asks for a room for the night. He wants to get going, to go as far from there as possible, and in all honesty, he wishes to leave the continent altogether. He hopes he still has a place in Korea, that he can still fit in there somehow, even though the words once native to him feel even more foreign than English does at this point. He sighs and washes his face in the basin upstairs, in the small room he was offered in exchange for his money, then heads for bed – he’s tired and he wants to rest while he can. A knife is put under the pillow, another one beneath the cheap bed, then he shuts his eyes and he’s out like a flame, no wonder there after the days he’s seen.

This precaution results in gashes deep enough to last for a lifetime – and to finish a lifetime on the spot –, but it’s not enough to fight off the bewildered people to leave him alone, no; they drag him out of the bed and tie his wrist together, and the harsh tie has his hands bloody and numb. He gets some punches to his head, not enough to break bones but enough to make him dizzy, to make the world look like something far, a dream, a nightmare as he’s dragged down the stairs, then God knows where. He feels the ground beneath his bare feet, they didn’t bother giving him his boots, it seems, and it hurts. Another hurt, he thinks, and he knows that it means more scars in the near future. He hates scars and hates people, and it doubles as he’s halted before a door. When he looks around, he realizes that they are out of the town, and there’s only one building in his sights; it’s larger than the average houses he’s seen, but it’s nowhere as nice as they are, no, it’s downright ugly with the rotting wood here and there. That’s how far his still nicely shaken thoughts are allowed to wander before someone tugs at his bound hands, and leads him to the first pillar at the stairs. He struggles, feels his hair coming lose from the bun on the top of his head, feels the weight of his hairpin disappear, and hisses as the rope digs in deeper into his flesh, but he achieves nothing. When he is properly tied to the post, the people gather in a group, a dark blur before his eyes, illuminated by the lanterns they carry, and they whisper amongst each other as they leave hurriedly.

It takes at least half an hour for him to get his mind working properly again, but he knows that he can’t get free – his wrist are so tightly bound that he has no feeling in his fingers. Even if he could reach down to touch his head, it’d be for nought – his pin is lost for good. He remembers his travels, his masters, the blood he’s spilt, and he accepts fate, accepts that he shall die deprived of peace and comfort which is how he has always imagined and feared. When it starts raining, he tries to curl in on himself as much as he can, but he’s soon as drenched as a rat in the sewers. His eyes close and his head falls back to the pillar two hours later, and he thinks he’s done for good.

 

***

 

What he doesn’t expect is to wake up again, and yet that is exactly what happens. He opens his eyes, and feels something wet and warm on his forehead. He reaches for it, hand aching as he turns it at the wrist, but before he could touch his head, a hand clasps around his arm, gently but firmly, guiding it back onto the blanket that is covering him from toe to chest. He looks to the side, and eyes the man he finds there warily. He has greying brown hair, matching goatee and clothes that might have been nice once, before the moths probably took a liking to the pieces. He has a stern look on his face, one that tells tales about years gone without smiles or laughs, but his eyes are reassuring, almost calming to look at.

“Take it easy, mon ami” he says, voice a rumbled, raspy noise, heard only as a distant whisper “you can rest now. I’ll look after you.”

He remembers saying something, then he remembers nothing, than a dream; a dream of reaching into a bowl of salty water, touching something that flickers out of his grasp, then pulling out his hands, now painted with blood that dripples down onto the floor, forming names he don’t want to remember. He remembers the ground breaking in two at the trace of blood, and remembers hands reaching out for him as he tries to run away, cold fingers digging into his wounds on his arms, dragging him down, down into that hole, into hell – and he throws himself to the side, hoping for a way out of his misery.

When he lands on his side, next to an unfamiliar bed, he taps on the gauze on his wrists, and feels the unfamiliar nightshirt he wears – it’s white and soft, even though it looks old and dusty at the creases. He’s awake, he realizes, and this is almost enough to calm him down – almost. He scrambles to his feet, feeling shaky and uncertain in every motion he makes, and this is something that he can’t allow himself – there is no place for weakness, and yet, he collapses on the bed and he praises whatever deity he still believes in that it wasn’t the floor.

There’s a drawer right next to the bed and he hastily goes through its contents, searching for anything he can use as a weapon if needed, but he finds nothing of the sort. He lays back, and sighs, thinking that if anyone would want him dead here, he wouldn’t be patched up so nicely, and he relaxes against the headboard. Maybe, just maybe, he thinks before he falls asleep again, he can finally spend some time with someone that’s nice to him.

He remembers some faint smells that are good and the distant aroma of tea – not strong enough to leave a bitter taste but not overly sweet either, and somehow he feels safe. Later, when his mind is clearer, he remembers calloused hands dressing him and tucking the cover around his form, placing the wet rag again and again on his forehead – and although the sensation it leaves on his overly hot skin is pleasant, he finds himself thinking that the hand that checked for fever was more soothing and enjoyable than the cold cloth.

 

When the door opens after he wakes to find himself fully conscious, the man he remembers seeing before enters, balancing a tray in one hand, setting it down in the nightstand. Whatever is on it, it smells like heaven for him, and he wants to eat. He eyes the man suspiciously, waiting for a sign, a word that the meal is for him. He’s learnt that not every food could be eaten without grave consequences, and he keeps himself to this. The man eyes him for a moment, glances to the tray, then back to him and finally he clears his throat, a small, almost decently hidden uneasiness lurking around the corner of his eyes and in the nervous twitch of his mouth.

“I hope you like chicken.”

He nods, and looks at the tray, still uncertain whether he can actually eat it or not, so he opens his mouth – it feels dry, and moving his lips hurts – and asks.

“May I?”

“I brought it for you, of course you can eat it. Should I leave you alone while you’re at it?”

“No, please, don’t” his answer is quick, as is the panic bubbling up in his chest. He doesn’t want to remain alone, not after the nightmares he had, not if he has a choice.

“All right, then I shall remain. My name is Goodnight, pleasure to meet you.”

He grabs the tray and holds it in his lap, but he doesn’t touch the food, not yet; he turns his head towards Goodnight and nods.

“My name is no longer mine, but you can call me Billy.”

 

***

 

Goodnight changes the bandage on his wrists and clears the wounds again the next night, brings him food and water, talks to him and lets him sleep as long as he wants, and Billy drifts in and out of a nightmare – again –, this time about rivers of blood coursing around his outstretched hands, defying gravity and joining together above his head only to drip back on his face, to splatter on his lips and go down in his throat, leaving behind a mixture of salt and sweetness. He wakes up trembling under the duvet, and standing on shaking legs, he looks out of the heavy curtains that shield the window. It is a bright day outside, but he wants no part of it, so he goes back to bed, and yields to some hours of calm sleep, finally bereft of dreams. He falls back to bed so quickly, he can’t see the figure standing in the door, barely open an inch, and he also doesn’t get to see how Goodnight’s steely eyes flash up in the shadows, reflecting back the light that crawls through the crease left between the curtain and the edge of the window. He does not witness this and he feels safe.

 

***

 

Goodnight looks at the man curled up under the duvet, his long hair that sticks out and falls into his face, looks at the relaxed face, looks at the doorknob and after minutes made of lead, he shuts the door and he feels horrible. He can’t. He won’t.

 

***

 

Billy calls the man Goodnight and Goodnight calls him _mon ami_ in return, and when Billy asks him what it means, Goodnight smiles. It is small but it is there – it is there along with the sadness on his face, along with that hurt and broken look that lurks in his eyes whenever they talk about the past, family or friends.

“It means ‘ _my friend_ ’” Goodnight says, his voice low and his words sincere, and it calms Billy. He believes this man – no, not only does he believe him, he wants – craves – to believe him. He grabs onto this belief, digs his fingers into the notion that they are friends and holds onto it and he plans to never let go. He remembers having friends, back in Korea, when he was still a child, when his greatest concern was to be a good son and an honest boy. Back then America was still far away and the kids he played with were close. He showed off his throwing skills with pebbles and not knives, and his victims were rotten fruits or torn sheets of paper instead of people. He silently yearns for those years, the painless, bright years and he finds himself wishing to call someone his friend again, and if Goodnight wants the same, he will not object. There are worse men to call friends, he reckons and hides his sudden smile in a mug of water.

There is one question, though, that silently and slowly nags him. Why was he brought here? Why would the townspeople drag him to this place, tie him to a post and leave him to his fate?

He brings it up on his second conscious day – well, the second conscious night, seeing how Goodnight prefers to sleep during the day and wake up only around seven in the afternoon – and Goodnight frowns at it. He is silent for a few moments, scratching at his nape with one hand, looking just as uncomfortable as Billy is starting to feel when no answer comes.

“They told you nothing, right? About me?”

“Nothing.”

“Alright, then” Goodnight says and then he proceeds to sit down at the already set table “Alright.”

Billy joins and eats the soup slowly, not looking at Goodnight, knowing well how some things are too hard to share when curious eyes seem to tear up your chest to look under the skin and between the bones. He lets the man have this small comfort, lets him have his complete attention without expressing it too eagerly, maybe because he is too familiar with or, or maybe because Goodnight already looks more broken than a man of his age should be.

“This is a small town, y’ see? And small towns are easy prey for outlaws. When I got here, there were only the Jones’ and a few other folks, good folks, that have already left or died. Well, them and me. They settled down there, but I, after everything that had happened, I wanted my own space. Wanted some solitary days – then months. And then spending years apart grew too appealing to give it up. So I stayed. And people kept arriving, settling down – but so did a few that wanted the peace the folks here had to end. They beat and murdered people, robbed them and left them on the noose. I stopped them.”

Billy’s eyes widen, the spoon in his hand is in the soup again, but he makes no moves to lift it up. He smiles and Goodnight’s fingers curl into fists to stop the trembles.

“You kill them?”

“Yes” he says and his nails dig into his flesh, clawing at skin he can’t damage permanently, skin that won’t hold the marks he deserves “No.”

Billy looks up and lets his gaze linger on the other man, watching as Goodnight’s head shakes, as his eyes turn everywhere but in his direction.

“I ate them.”

Billy stares at him with an unreadable expression, then reaches out and touches the inside of his wrist to Goodnight’s temple, as if checking for a fever that Goodnight knows he should never be able to have. He smirks, although it is filled with pain and his eyes are radiating the uncertainty he’s feeling at this gesture. Lifts a hand and traces Billy’s wrist with a finger, turns his head and lets his lips brush against it, lets himself smell the blood and skin and salt – then Billy retracts his arm, but not in a hurry and not with disgust.

“You didn’t” Billy says and eats his soup, as if he was unbothered, and Goodnight is almost ready to accept that maybe he truly is.

“I did, or, well, I didn’t exactly eat them, you see. Only drank their blood.”

“So what are you” Billy asks and watches as Goodnight takes the cup in his hands and twirls the spoon five times; always five times. It’s like every other thing the man does: he knocks three on Billy’s door, he folds two napkins for every tray he carries up for him and claps his thumb and middle finger together whenever he feels anxious or uncertain. Well, Billy supposes, one can get used to things if left alone for too long.

“Something else.”

“I am something else, too. Here, in the States, I am.”

“I’m afraid that’s not the same thing, mon ami. I’m a creature not meant to walk on this Earth. You are you. A human. Just like everyone normal.”

“Everyone normal, you say? If those who got me here in hopes of pleasing you or getting rid of me or both, if those are the ‘everyone normal’, then I wish to keep my distance from them.”

“Fair point.”

They sink into silence, only breaking it with the cluttering of their dishes, and somehow neither of them find it uncomfortable or strained – they look at each other at one point and smile.

“Folk and their tales call me a vampire, a creature from the European legends – which turned out to be real. I drink blood and well, in a society that would deny that I’m a person, and should be treated as such, it’s easier to get blood through killing those that no one would miss.”

“And yet, people seem to like them more than you.”

“Yes, that is indeed my greatest sadness.”

Goodnight looks at Billy, and finds him smiling, his eyes twinkling with life and good-natured mirth – and maybe, maybe there is something like love, but Goodnight won’t fool himself. He looks absolutely delighted, not like someone who has just been told that he’s sitting at the table with an abomination of God.

“Aren’t you repulsed by that?”

Billy twirls the spoon between his fingers and puts it in the empty bowl, then reaches out and grabs Goodnight’s hands, shakes them, then links their fingers, and Goodnight lets him.

“Not the slightest. You still eat stuff that’s not people, right?”

“Stuff that’s not people still tastes great, so yes. Why’d you ask?”

“Wanna cook you something.”

 

***

 

That’s how they agree on Billy going back to the town, to the general store for some ingredients he needs, and that’s how the people living there see him on a nice morning, strolling through the houses as if it was the most usual thing. For Billy it is. He has knives lent by Goodnight, his hairpin sits in his hair and he is ready to bring the skies down if anyone stands between him and the eggs and sausage he still needs. Maybe some spices, too, if the storekeeper has them, he thinks, and nods to a woman sitting on a porch, staring at him as if he was the devil itself. Apparently for the good people of this backwater town he is not such a usual sight, which he can wholeheartedly understand. If the reception for outsiders is such as his, it is no wonder travellers tend to avoid this place, and words are faster than bullets; if anyone ever survived their hospitality, that would have been heard by lots.

He wants to make the trip short, not really feeling up to talking or meddling with the folk there, so he buys whatever he needs, then proceeds to go back – to go home to Goodnight. Little does he know that he’s being followed, and he is also unaware of how too many eyes take it in as he kisses Goodnight on the mouth in the middle of the living room, where the curtains are slightly open. That is their first kiss, given because Billy has returned, and returned soundly, not harmed by the idiocy of the people, not harmed because of his association with Goodnight. The man feels relieved and holds Billy close, feels his warmth and breath and heartbeat and he kisses his neck, kisses where he wants to bite, and he tries to hold back, tries to not go for it, but then, then Billy says that he can, that he should, and Goodnight drinks.

 

***

 

The next day is hazy for Billy, but Goodnight spoils him with warm drinks and searing kisses and affectionate caresses. He combs Billy’s hair and lays with him under the blanket, lays with him and leads his fingers over his skin, eyes filled with adoration. Billy lets him do anything as he curls closer, wishing for the contact of skin against skin, wishing for the feeling of being held, wishing for Goodnight and his kisses, wishing for this comfort to never end. He sleeps in Goodnight’s arms, dreams of death and despair and Goodnight standing above all of it, triumphing and offering Billy a hand.

 

***

 

And the townsfolk get there, get to their house, their home, and with blazing torches and hatred-filled hearts they light it, and the wind catches the flames, raises them high and gives them the wings of destruction. They blaze with the same colour as the fallen leaves on the ground, as the setting sun, just on its way to ascend to the underworld and leave them between the long and frightening shadows, among the tall trees surrounding the house, standing gravely over the folks gathered to watch as Goodnight Robicheaux and the man enthralled by that ungodly creature are going to burn to ashes. They do not know yet, how could they, that those trees will be their crosses, that the ashes of the home will be their pallet, that the night air will never leave their souls rest in peace, but as the first man shouts and collapses, as the second follows him to a heartbeat later, they look at the fire and they look around, knowing well that there are no people inside, but those who are out are no people anymore. They are not humans, they are fiends and they were wronged by the town, they were sentenced to death by the town, and now the town shall pay its due. They shake and they run, but there is no way that leads away from the Robicheaux estate, there are only paths to hell and their own personal devils are waiting. They know. They die.

There are shots fired into the darkness, into the woods, into wherever they are aiming without targets, and there is one heart-wrenching cry that sounds like ‘Billy’, there is a howl, a demon’s shriek, and then a sudden silence. The folks shake as the air cools and they quiet down, hoping that someone will tell that the fiends are no more, that it is safe to go. Little do they know that they will never know safety again. A pained noise breaks through the night, shatters hopes and freezes the souls. Damnation is on its way and there is no way out.  

Billy hurts and feels an eternal cold etching itself into his bones, he feels as if the world was too much, feels like himself and someone else, and there is Goodnight, kind, soft Goodnight with bloodied mouth and bloodied fingers, and he smiles and smiles and smiles with tears in his eyes. It takes only a breath – the lack of it – for Billy to understand, to realise, but then he is calm and when he moves towards the attackers it’s not for vengeance on himself but justice that moves his steps.

Billy eats for the first time and his heart is still while he is moving between the people, his breath carries the smell of fresh blood and flesh, his eyes carry the very depths of his soul, those depths that wish for the death of these people.

No one is left to tell the tale how a small, quiet town in the middle of nowhere got empty over a single night, but there are rumours that will always remain, rumours about two men on the road coming from there, looking content and smiling at each other, rumours about dozens of bodies found in a burnt down house, rumours about the children wailing for their fathers as their mothers ran with them on that night that wiped out their homes. But, after all, that is the nature of rumours – they come, they go, they change and, most importantly, they become legends and live forever – just like the men whom these rumours are about.

**Author's Note:**

> I kinda wanted to make this sound a bit like a tale? But I think I failed at it.  
> All in all, though, I'm extremely happy that I could finish it in time, which was still in question a few days ago.


End file.
